By Larry Fleming
larryfleming@daltoncitizen.com
May 10, 2008 12:47 am
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Southeast pressured the goal most of the game. Attacked from the sides. Attacked up the middle. Pushed the ball at the net where 5-foot-8 Yonathan Arroqui, the Lakeside-DeKalb junior captain, performed admirably and kept the top-ranked Vikings in a scoreless duel with the third-ranked Raiders.
Arroqui’s play enabled the Vikings to hang around, eventually beat the Raiders on penalty kicks and leave town with the Class 4A state soccer championship.“It was really frustrating, especially in the last minutes (of regulation play),” Southeast’s Eduardo Guerrero said. “We wanted to score bad and that’s what kept us going.”
Arroqui refused to wilt. In fact, he felt comfortable resisting the Raiders’ attacking style of play.
“I didn’t feel any pressure at all,” Arroqui said. “I was in no danger. I never felt threatened, not once. Our defense is great. It’s the best defense in the state.”
When the teams battled through 80 minutes of regulation play and two five-minute overtime periods, the game went to penalty kicks.
At that point, the diminutive Arroqui gave way to 6-foot-4 senior Alec Kann, who has signed a soccer scholarship with Furman University. Kann gave up a penalty kick to the Raiders’ Victor Rodriguez, but then stuffed successive shots by Fernando Villaseñor, Luis Hernandez and Carlos Flores to nail down the Vikings’ seventh state title and set off a celebration among the Lakeside players and fans.
Guerrero felt height was the only advantage the Vikings had over the Raiders in the title game.
“We got one or two guys who are tall, but they had guys all over the field taller than us,” he said. “That gave us some problems.”
The Vikings, 5-0 in penalty kick games this season, have gone to Kann in each of those situations, but it still doesn’t diminish the confidence Arroqui has in himself.
“I’m 17 years old and have been playing goalie since I was 7,” Arroqui said. “I’m 5-8 and can get up higher than any forward on the field, but I understand why coach (Rick Barbe) goes with Alec.”
Southeast senior Jorge Gutierrez, nicknamed “King Jorge,” gave plenty of credit to Arroqui for keeping the Raiders out of the net.
“He was a heck of a player,” Gutierrez said. “We had chances to score, but just couldn’t get the ball in the net.
“This was unbelievable. It wasn’t what we wanted because we expected to win the game. We tried our best against a good team with a lot of big players. We kept things on the ground because you can’t beat a tall team with shots in the air. Unfortunately, none of our shots got in the net.”
Gutierrez was hugging teammates, classmates and others around midfield while he talked.
“We came close but we accomplished a lot by getting to the championship game for the first time for our school. We did good things and I’m happy about that. I’m satisfied with all that. I’m crying because it’s my last game at Southeast.”
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